


No Parenthesis

by versayce



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-09
Updated: 2015-05-09
Packaged: 2018-03-29 16:01:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3902266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/versayce/pseuds/versayce
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>It’s the third time now he’s dying, and, as usual, his last thoughts circle back and settle on one James Buchanan Barnes. Even he – sharp as a bowling ball, Bucky would say – finally understands.</i>
</p><p>But actually - plain old porn. Although in my defense a good solid half of this is not dedicated to graphic sex. Uh. I am a failure as a writer, and a decent human being.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Parenthesis

**Author's Note:**

> The other thing I'm working on got into 5-figure-word-count territory and I needed a break so I thought hey, I'll write something short and sweet and _meaningful_. Thing is, I'm a huge pervert I guess, and it became a lovingly detailed description of Steve and Bucky fucking instead. But, as e. e. cummings would say, "kisses are a better fate than wisdom." The title is from that poem.

Steve’s last coherent thought down in that secret SSR lab (in Brooklyn, of all places, and please let that be a sign, let it _mean_ something), cocooned in a metal coffin, before his whole world narrows to a litany of ‘oh god oh god oh god’, is— ‘If I get out of this alive, Bucky’s gonna kill me.’

It’s not so bad at first, before the heavy panels slide around to lock him up in darkness. The tiled room smells strongly of bleach and antiseptic, that familiar hospital scent, but there’s something else underneath it. A hint of warm plastic and metal from all those machines, humming with electricity. It’s a smell Steve remembers for the rest of his life.

He feels a bit like the corpse in one of those paintings, being dissected in a medical theatre while curious onlookers watch. He’s got the pallor for it alright. Erskine’s touch soothes, and Peggy is somewhere in the gallery. He tries to focus on them instead of the suits and lab coats swirling around the periphery of his vision but eventually everything blurs into a single overwhelming churn.

Then it all shifts and with a clang he’s alone in that small suffocating space.

Bucky will definitely kill him. Isn’t this exactly what he said would happen? Steve would keep beating against the door and if it opened, well, there’s going to be something horrible on the other side. But he wants this, more than anything he’s ever wanted in his whole life, and now, impossibly, he’s getting a shot at it. Bucky would understand.

Except, no – he really wouldn’t. All those times he’d stepped in and prevented a broken bone or two, cleaned blood off his face, grimaced at another ruined shirt.

‘I’m gonna kill you myself someday if you keep this up, save someone else the trouble. Save myself the aneurysm from having to worry about you all the damn time too.’

‘You don’t understand, Bucky. You can’t.’

‘No, maybe not this exactly.’ Bucky pokes him in the ribs. ‘But I understand just fine. Everyone’s got things in ‘em that get trampled on. What _you_ don’t understand is that you can’t fight it off, the way it hurts. You can’t beat it into submission.’

Steve doesn’t answer and Bucky gets that pained look on his face, part frustration, part worry, part— Something.

‘Stevie, you gotta know…’ He sighs then. ‘You gotta know you’re worth ten of those goons. Every ugly thing they say, there’s something better inside you that they don’t see.’

Bucky squeezes his shoulder. It’s reassuring, in a temporary sort of way, and Steve wishes he could really believe him, carry that sentiment with him like a shield against the world.

Then the light begins to grow, brighter and brighter, burning and bubbling under his skin and it hurts, oh god, oh god oh god oh god…

***

Steve’s last thought before he hits the ice – after the fear, after the clawing regret at losing that incredible, impossible thing he almost had with Peggy – is pretty weird. He doesn’t even remember it for a while after waking up, but then one day he walks into a room and the sun is slanting in just the right way and it sends him reeling.

It’s not so much a thought as the memory of a feeling. The frozen ground is almost there in his face when suddenly he gets tugged away, back to his bedroom in Brooklyn when he was ten years old maybe. He’s lying in bed, by the window, with the sun pouring in, head to toe with Bucky. They’re devouring some brand new comic books. Or, he’s sketching and Bucky’s napping. Or, they’re doing homework, careful to get the answers right in slightly different ways so it’s not cheating. Or, they’re lazily throwing a baseball back and forth while talking about something that seemed really important at the time.

Not just a memory, more like a dedicated space in his mind for all the sunny afternoons he’s spent with Bucky in that room, opposite each other on the bed. Specific instances superimposed and blended into one, the pattern repeated over and over until it’s worn deep grooves into the page. It pulls him in like a gravity well, stronger than the stinging wind whipping his face, than that overwhelming flood of fear and regret.

Bright and sweet and warm, and then there's quiet nothing.

Steve wonders about it. It’s not something he thinks about often - he rarely has a reason to dust off childhood memories - but if he closes his eyes and lets himself drift he always finds that sunny corner, tucked away behind the loss and the fighting and even the love. Under all the things he thought were important, there’s this.

***

Steve’s last thought as he’s falling out of the burning sky, before hitting the water knocks the consciousness out of him, is that he’s glad. He’s so glad. He’d smile if his face wasn’t just a lump of bruises and broken bones.

Even if he dies, he’s glad he got to see him again. Even like that, barely a flicker of recognition, so little of him left after whatever they did to him – it was more than he could possibly have hoped for.

It's the third time now he’s dying, and, as usual, his last thoughts circle back and settle on one James Buchanan Barnes. Even he – sharp as a bowling ball, Bucky would say – finally understands. It’s too late, because that’s the running joke of his life, but he understands now there’s nothing he can do, can’t change it by throwing a punch. It’s enough that this thing, this one good thing, is unfolding inside him, and he’s glad.

***

Steve’s first thought as he wakes up all tangled in disgusting, crunchy-sticky sheets is that Bucky needs a shave. It’s not the first time he’s ever woken up next to him, in the same bed even, but it’s the first time like this.

It’s light enough outside that he doesn’t feel guilty running his fingertips over the stubble on Bucky’s jaw, waking him up. Bucky doesn’t seem to mind. He smiles, says ‘Morning,’ and stretches in a way that leaves him half-draped all over Steve when he's through.

After everything else, getting here, to this bed, with this man mouthing small half-hearted kisses into his neck, seemed so easy. It was simple, really, on the couch the night before, turning his head to say something snide about the movie they’re watching but only managing a ‘can you believe—‘ before realizing that Bucky’s been looking at him, probably for a while now. He wasn’t meant to see, and it’s so open, so soft, a look he remembers from before, only now he’s got a truly impressive supply of hindsight and he finally sees it for what it is.

It’s almost unconscious, the way Steve shifts his weight, twists around and leans in closer. Slow at first, to make sure, but then Bucky’s moving too and his eyes are fixed on Steve's mouth so he goes for it, even though his heart's pounding and his hands are numb with nerves. They come together at a glacial pace, and by the time their lips actually touch Bucky’s smiling. It’s just a light brush, not really a kiss at all, but Steve feels every tiny, tingling point of contact, every breath.

Bucky pulls away an inch, leaving a small hot space between them. Still smiling, he says, ‘You better mean it,’ but it’s unnecessary. They both know now. Steve isn’t sure what it is exactly that they know, but he’s suddenly very aware of his lips, and Bucky’s, in a way he’s never been before. He slides a hand over Bucky’s side in lieu of an answer and pulls him back in.

Compared to everything that came before – the Great Depression, his sickness, the war, the years lost to ice, and then finding each other again in the worst way, the months and months of tracking Bucky down, of convincing him to come in, of watching him struggle to unearth all the human parts of himself they buried – compared to all that, kissing Bucky is a piece of cake. The movie plays in the background, throwing flickering light into the dark room. They kiss again and again, moving closer each time until Steve manages to push down whatever fucked up thing is keeping him from doing it, and straddles Bucky’s lap.

Bucky breaks the kiss and laughs a bit. ‘It’s real sexy, that look of grim determination you got on your face right now.’ He’s teasing, but Steve doesn’t care because it’s true. He’s determined – so determined – not to let this slip away. He chases Bucky’s mouth, would chase him anywhere, for however long it took.

But it doesn’t take very long for them to slide together close enough to realize they’re both hard. It does something to Steve’s brain, to feel it and know what it means, about him, about Bucky. Makes him feel needed in a way he’s not sure he ever has, especially not here in the 21st century, in this wholesale kind of way – all the things that only Bucky could even know about him to want.

They end up in Bucky’s bed, though Steve’s reluctant to move off his lap at first because it’s good, it’s hot, he wants to stay there forever. But Bucky pushes and pulls and tugs and shoves him down, finally, and then their clothes come off and something about the way Bucky touches him is addictive. He runs a hand along Steve’s side and when it comes up for a second to shift somewhere else the skin there feels magnetized. Steve wants to grab and hold on, so he does, he wants to keep kissing, and they do.

It only takes a split second to make the decision – Steve’s not even sure it’s a decision so much as a hot wave of want suddenly crashing into him – but saying it seems somehow beyond him. He’s determined, though. He practices in his head through the kisses and the increasingly insistent touches, thinks: _Buck, I want you to fuck me. No, wait. I want you to fuck me, Bucky. Please? Do you say please? No. Ok. Fuck me, Bucky? Damn it._

It doesn’t help, to practice, but he wants it enough to finally still Bucky’s roaming hands, draw back from his mouth. He says, ‘I want you to fuck me,’ and for a moment it seems as though Bucky’s eyes are gonna roll right back in his head. He groans and all but collapses on the bed, head buried in a pillow.

‘Jesus, Steve, you gotta warn a guy…’ and in some new unfamiliar way, Steve is proud of himself for doing this, for making Bucky look up with liquid-dark eyes, worrying his lip. A moment passes and Steve watches emotions shift and flit across Bucky’s face before it settles on something like hunger. Quick and fluid, Bucky stretches to grab a tube of lotion from the nightstand, then he’s back to covering Steve’s body with his own, metal arm coming up above Steve’s head so he can brace himself.

They’re kissing again, and Steve begins to worry about what Bucky’s other arm is doing. He’s suddenly very aware of everything – the sound of the cap on the lotion popping, how distracted Bucky’s kissing has become, the soft familiar whirrs and whines of Bucky’s metal arm so close to his ear as his weight shifts and it adjusts. Bucky’s hand nudges at the inside of Steve’s knee and he almost instinctively spreads his legs. Then he has to close his eyes because Bucky’s fingers are warm and slick as they wrap around his length, giving him a few tugs and then moving on to rub slow circles behind his balls, working lower with every pass. It’s too much.

Before dipping his fingers all the way down Bucky asks, ‘Ok?’

Steve thinks he manages a nod, a grunt of affirmation. Bucky nuzzles at his cheek, whispers ‘Relax,’ and gets to work massaging the clenched ring of muscle in Steve’s ass, thumb pressing firmly into that spot just above it, behind his balls. It's like being taken apart, slowly, methodically. Bucky stops for a bit to squeeze on more lotion and Steve is grateful for the pause, tries to calm his heartbeat a little, but still he’s not ready when Bucky's fingers come back and slip inside him, now that he’s looser and everything’s so slippery. The newness and intimacy of it suddenly knocks the breath out of Steve, makes him squirm. Bucky catches his mouth in a kiss to pull him back out into the moment, but Steve’s breathing still goes fast and shallow as Bucky twists his fingers, presses, stretches him out. It feels weird, foreign, especially when Bucky adds more lotion, one more finger, but it’s also hot and sweet and it makes Steve’s thighs shake a little. He wonders, briefly, where in the hell Bucky learned to do this.

Suddenly Bucky's fingers are gone. Steve barely has time to complain before he hears more lotion being squirted and then Bucky kisses him dirty and deep, tongue probing all around his mouth, and Steve can feel it – hard and slick and pressing into him, slow. It hurts, but he’s not unused to pain. It’s more good than painful, his body rearranging somehow to make room, fit Bucky inside him. It’s right, it’s good, this thing that he never even knew to want but now that it’s happening it makes so much sense.

Bucky slides all the way inside, groaning into his mouth as he does, and Steve wants to say something, to tell him how good it is, but all he can manage is to wrap his arms up around Bucky’s shoulders and exhale long and shaky when he bottoms out. Bucky stays there a while and Steve feels every bit of it. Slight movements as he breathes, his own cock trapped between their bellies, already leaking, and something inside him, something Bucky rubbed against when he slid in, is melting.

Steve can’t stand it, needs to move, so he rolls his hips just a little. It draws a sharp ‘God,’ from Bucky, who takes the hint and starts moving slow and careful but Steve says, ‘It’s ok, come on Buck,’ and lifts up to meet his thrusts, which is when Bucky happily discards his threadbare self-control and picks up the pace. He slams into him and sets off sparks, then draws all the breath out of him and then again, and again, and that feeling of breathless fire builds in Steve until Bucky wraps a hand around his cock, jerks him roughly a few times, and the combination of how good it feels inside and out pushes him over the edge. He comes long and loud and sticky between their bodies and around Bucky’s cock, moving deep in him, where he feels the spasm of muscles he hadn’t even known factored into it.

Steve doesn’t realize how rigid he went until he’s coming down off it, turning soft and pliant. Bucky’s hand is sliding around on his stomach, in the mess he made, and it feels different being fucked now, a little overwhelming but still good. Bucky’s close, and Steve’s not sure why he does it but he brings his knees up a bit, changes the angle, and the sounds it draws from Bucky’s mouth are almost enough to make him hard again. Bucky thrusts once, twice, and then buries himself deep and all but snarls in Steve’s ear, cock twitching inside him. Steve turns his face and kisses Bucky’s temple, the corner of his eye, high on the cheekbone, as he shakes through it.

It doesn’t matter that they’re sweaty and disgusting and the whole room smells like ass and aloe vera from the lotion. Steve notes the burn of Bucky pulling out of him in a distant, disinterested way, knows that in the morning it will be gone. Bucky rolls off, flops on his back, his chest still heaving, and the smile on his face is bright and dirty.

When he manages to catch his breath, Bucky turns his head to him, says, ‘Holy shit. That was…’ but Steve can only grunt vaguely in response. He feels wrung out in the best way possible. Bucky reaches over with a corner of the sheet they’ve completely stripped off the bed with all their twisting, and tries a few half-hearted wipes at the wetness on Steve’s belly. Then he gets a gleam in his eyes that Steve takes an immediate liking to, and dips the sheet lower between Steve's legs to soak up some of the come that’s already leaking out whenever he shifts.

‘You’re disgusting,’ Steve says, but he’s smiling too as he rolls to his side for a kiss.

Bucky hums against his mouth, says, ‘A man’s allowed to take pride in his accomplishments,’ and pulls Steve close, burying his face in his neck.

That’s how Steve falls asleep, and there isn’t a single goddamn thought in his head as he drifts off. Not a one.


End file.
